MOSCOW, March 23 (Reuters) - Chinese President Xi Jinping
warned against foreign interference in the affairs of other
nations during a speech in Moscow on Saturday, sending a signal
to the West and echoing a message often repeated by Russian
President Vladimir Putin.

Permanent U.N. Security Council members with veto power,
Russia and China have frequently teamed up diplomatically to
blunt the influence of the United States and its NATO allies and
have blocked three draft resolutions on Syria.

"We must respect the right of each country in the world to
independently choose its path of development and oppose
interference in the internal affairs of other countries," Xi
told students at an international relations school.

He spoke a day after meeting Putin on his first foreign trip
since becoming president, a choice both said underscored a
"strategic partnership" between Russia and China.
In the Kremlin, he told Putin: "you and I are
good friends."

Xi told Russian students on Saturday: "Strong
Chinese-Russian relations ... not only answer to our interests
but also serve as an important, reliable guarantee of an
international strategic balance and peace."

Putin, who began a six-year term last May, has often
criticised foreign interference in sovereign states.

Russia and China have resisted Western calls to pressure
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad over the two-year-old civil
conflict that has killed more than 70,000 people.

They both criticised the NATO bombing that helped rebels
overthrow Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2011 and stood
together in the Security Council in votes on the Iranian and
North Korean nuclear programmes.

Both China and Russia have bristled at U.S. and European
criticism of their human rights records.

Putin said in a foreign policy decree issued at the start of
his new term that Russia would counter attempts to use human
rights as a pretext for interference, and his government has
cracked down on foreign-funded non-governmental organisations.

FRIENDSHIP AND FEAR

Xi told Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev his visit had
"surpassed my expectations" and said he had chosen Russia as his
first foreign destination as president to "show the special
importance of our relations."

Despite the warm words, Moscow is concerned that its far
more populous, faster-growing neighbour could pose a threat,
something that has not made for easy deals between the world's
biggest energy producer, Russia, and its biggest consumer,
China.

Xi's visit produced an agreement for Russian state giant
Rosneft to gradually treble oil supplies to China, but
the sides are still short of a deal on the supply of pipeline
gas to China, thwarted for years over prices.

Viktor Yaskov, a student who attended Xi's address, said the
Chinese leader made "a good impression", but expressed fears
about the neighbour. "We're worried about Chinese economic
expansion," he said.

Xi arrived in Moscow with glamorous first lady Peng Liyuan,
prompting speculation about whether Putin's wife Lyudmila - last
seen at a state event last May - would make an appearance.

That did not happen, and Peng kept a low profile after her
first steps off the airplane caused an Internet sensation in
China.

After Russia, Xi will visit Tanzania, the Republic of Congo
and South Africa, where he and Putin are expected to meet again
at a summit of the BRICS group of emerging economies next week.